The present application relates generally to an improved data processing apparatus and method and more specifically to mechanisms for importing pre-existing data of a prior storage solution into a storage pool for use with a new storage solution.
With the introduction of new data storage management solutions into a customer environment, the continued use of pre-existing data created within an older storage management solution often needs to be maintained. This continued use of pre-existing data is usually handled in one of three ways. In a first option, the pre-existing storage management solution is maintained side-by-side with the new storage management solution. This option limits the customer because no new functional capabilities with the newer storage management solution can be shared with the pre-existing data under continued management of the older storage management solution. Moreover, this option introduces additional management complexity because the old storage management solution must be maintained along with the new storage management solution.
In a second option, the data may be dumped to a raw format media, e.g., magnetic tape, and then re-imported into the new storage management solution as if it were new data. This solution tends to be impractical due to the massive amounts of data involved and the time required to move data between systems, e.g., between the host system and a raw format media system and then back from the raw format media system into the system configured with the new storage management solution.
As a third option, the new storage management solution may be developed so that it ensures compatibility with the old storage management solution and thus, merely adds-on to the pre-existing storage management solution. This option often limits the user to a product line from one exclusive vendor, i.e. the customer can only obtain storage management solutions from the same vendor since the customer requires backward compatibility to access the pre-existing data, and often does not expand the data management capability of the pre-existing data since the new storage management solution is limited in what it can do by the need to provide backward compatibility. This is primarily because the data in the storage management solution is often closely tied and described by internal storage solution metadata that is proprietary to the pre-existing storage management solution.